"Well," said "California," "all that's good preparation."
The huge man shot him a glance and the two pairs of blue eyes held each other. Then "California" smiled his winsomest and said: "Did you ever notice how much easier you can see through the ends of an iron pipe than through its sides?"
Gideon stared. "Humph! Any fool that wants to see through me may see and be--joyful. What do you think you see?"
"Oh, things you'd ought to thought of and never have."
"Shouldn't wonder a bit," said "California" so amiably that the big man laughed.
"No, but you'll be told, shortly, if the man I think I know is the man I--think I know. Let's pass that now, commodore. Oh, I wish you'd been with us on the _Votaress_. How different things might 'a' turned out. You know? I don't believe any other trip on all this big river, barring the first steamboat's first, ever made so big a turning-point in so many lives. Why, jest two or three things in it, things and people, made me another man."
"Yes, and not so hungry to hang other fellers. I hadn't ever met up with such aristocratic stock as I did then but I tchuned right up to 'em and I've mighty nigh held their pitch ever sence. Fo'most of all was this Hugh Courteney. Fo'most because, he being a man, I wa'n't afraid of him. But a close second was yo' daughter; second because, she being a woman, I was afraid of her. Why, even Phyllis, that's now chambermaid on this boat----"
"By Jupiter!" Gideon Hayle half started from his seat. "On this boat? our Phyllis? that Ramsey set free?"
"Look here, my boy, is that why you're aboard?"
"No, sir-ee! Don't you fret. That trip, I tell you, made another man of me. It lifted; why, commodore, it made me a poet."
"Yes, sir. Writ poetry ever sence. Dropped prose; too easy. It's real poetry, commodore; rhymes as slick as grease. Show you some of it later."
"George! if you do I'll jump into the river."
"Agreed! I've got some that'll make you do that."
Neither smiled, neither frowned. Obviously each knew how to like an adversary and when "California" rose and the two, glancing aft, saw another two approaching from the pilot-house, one of whom was Watson, Hayle touched the poet detainingly and said:
"Don't go 'way, I want some more of your prose."